The All of Us Research Program, a project of the National Institutes of Health, aims to gather health data from one million people living in the United States. I was chosen to participate in one of the University of California, San Francisco’s research feedback sessions for the initiative.

Many of the trans and non-binary people participating in the feedback session discussed their personal experiences with medical providers and researchers. Many brought up the mistrust that trans people have for researchers.

By John Shields, PhD, MSW | July 28, 2016Senior Research Associate, ETR

Recent publications have focused our nation’s attention on ensuring the safety and well-being of transgender students. We have been encouraged to safeguard their full access to all educational programs and activities.

In their “Dear Colleague” letter of May 2016, the U.S. Departments of Justice and Education have issued clear principles designed to “help ensure that transgender students enjoy a supportive and nondiscriminatory school environment.” In July, the California School Board Association released “Updated Legal Guidance” to help California school districts move from principle to practice.

The entire month of June is celebrated the world over as LGBTQ Pride month. This year, I started the celebration June 6 in my hometown of Santa Cruz, California. A few hundred marchers walked about a quarter of a mile along our downtown avenue, cheered on by neighbors and friends.

There were plenty of families and kids, dogs, bubbles, fairy wings and rainbow-themed accessories. The parade was over in 45 minutes. It was lovely and low-key. My wife and I talked about the easy-going vibe of the festival. The LGBTQ community achieved nationally recognized marriage equality in 2015, and now, in 2016, the fire and fury seemed to have quieted down.

My car rolled to a stop at a crosswalk. A young man strode across my path. Even with my tired, end-of-a-long-workday brain, I noticed his confident bearing. He stared ahead, eyes slightly narrowed. His cap was pulled low on his forehead.

And then I did a double take. The young man was actually a client in my psychotherapy practice—a young lesbian I had just seen in a session. She glanced my way, smiled and nodded, and we both moved on.

A post by Emmie Matsuno on the Psychology Benefits Society blog (American Psychological Association) brought this memory, and that client, to mind. It’s titled, “Are You a Boy or Girl? No: Living Outside the Gender Binary.”

Transgender people are in our families, our communities, our workplaces, our faith communities and our schools. They are part of the fabric of our society. Yet stigma and discrimination can make it extraordinarily difficult for transgender people to make their way in the world, and for everyone to learn accurate information about the lives and experiences of transgender people.

LGBTQ youth face a number of elevated risks in the general and sexual health arenas—including some we might not expect, such as increased risk of pregnancy. They are also more likely to get STDs, be sexually victimized and participate in survival sex.

A promising strategy for reducing these risks is building greater equity, responsiveness and inclusiveness in our sex education programs.

Confinement has its costs. There are costs to being confined physically, emotionally, sexually, mentally or spatially for any period of time. You can often tell when people have grown up in isolation, or with little social interaction. They seem unprepared for social exchanges.

I have seen a version of this with members of the LGBT community. We grow up and discover that what we feel on the inside is seen as wrong in the larger world around us. We learn that who we are “goes against” religious and historical principles.

It has been a momentous morning. My wife and I took an early hike. We were out on the trail when we got the text from @HRC about the Supreme Court decision on same-sex marriage. “Reply w/pics to show how you’re celebrating,” they asked.

We grinned. We cried. We took a selfie out there in our little patch of wilderness. And not surprisingly, we both began a survey of our lives, and this struggle, where we’ve been and this place we’ve come to now. Change is powerful stuff, for a person and for a nation.

A study has recently come out that has everyone in my field talking. I’ve seen posts about it in newsletters and blogs about it on social media. Announcements were made in all my professional networks. This new study shows that lesbian, gay and bisexual teens are more likely to experience a pregnancy than their heterosexual counterparts.

I was happy to see that this new research was getting people in my community talking about an issue I care deeply about: the health and well-being of youth—especially the health and well-being of youth who identify as lesbian, gay or bisexual. However, this is not new information. This research confirms something we have known for many years and is not, in fact, “shocking.”

The shock people are feeling, I think, is due to the fact that this study requires us to reflect on our own assumptions about the lives and sexual behaviors of young people.

By Cary Klemmer | April 29, 2015MSW/PhD Student, University of Southern California

Being able to attend a national health summit for transgender folks is one amazing thing in and of itself. Being able to present and share the narratives of transgender youth at that conference is another!

Last April 17-18, I had the great honor of both attending and presenting at the National Transgender Health Summit 2015 in Oakland, California. This event was made possible due to the diligence and hard work of the conference staff, including the UCSF Center of Excellence for Transgender Health and ETR, which co-sponsored the event.